Let’s face it, there are going to be casualties in this Kickstarter-fought battle for a post-publisher age. The game formerly and rather boringly known as Crowdsourced Hardcore Tactical Shooter does not want to be one of those. With not too long left on the clock, it’s been relaunched as Takedown, with lead dev Christian Allen (of GRAW fame) admitting that the initial promotion pulled a punch or seven. He writes on Kotaku that, in addition to not being a celebrityface like Tim Fargo or Brian Schafer, “our video was not exciting enough and the quality wasn’t up to the standard it should have been. Lastly, we were too vague about the details of the project, lacked assets to show, and didn’t properly differentiate our concept from other shooters on the market today. Oh, and the name SUCKED.”

That is true. So now it is the bland but far less off-putting Takedown, it’s billed as a ‘squad-based tactical shooter’ and, as you’ll see in the below video, it’s found itself both a sense of humour and a clearer sense of purpose.
What Allen really wants to get across that this is not a Jack Bauer or sci-fi experience – it’s like olde worlde, squad-based Ghost Recon, Rainbow Six or SWAT. Plan, think, act and all that. The video below tells the tale rather entertainingly, but nitty-gritty can be browsed here.

Or, in words:

“TAKEDOWN is a thinking-person’s shooter. The player that takes things slow, aims carefully, and plans their moves right will overcome the player who runs in with guns blazing. Close-quarters battle brings the fight inside, as you would see SWAT teams or SOF units taking down small numbers of dangerous adversaries. Non-linear environments allow for multiple routes and tactics and add replayability. You will plan your insertions and routes before going into the scenario, outfitting your teammates with weapons and equipment of your choosing, and then execute the mission. If one of your team members is killed, they are gone, and you have lost their valuable experience, so you have to be careful! Gameplay modes include single player, co-op, and competitive multiplayer.”

With five days left on the Kickclock, Allen and chums have raised almost $90,000 of the $200,000 they need to make an alpha, which they claim they can then take to private investors to prove this whole thing is viable and bring in an even fatter cash injection.

So, if you’re now now more tempted to contribute, here’s where to go. It’s a laudably ambitious project for sure, though it’s one more way in which the RPS Hivemind has a spot of moral deliberation about what Kickstarter projects we write about and how often. Every time we mention one, we’ll get emails about a few others and queries as to why we haven’t covered them yet, or more. Occasionally and understandably, these emails are distressed.

Given the nature of Kickstarter is to ask people to put down money for a product that doesn’t yet exist, we have to be incredibly careful to restrict our posts to projects with enough of an established pedigree that the chances of people who’ve paid as a result of reading something we’ve written being let down are minimal. Anyone can write down a good idea and make it exciting – but can they pull it off? Until such time we are relatively sure they can, it is only sensible to not suggest our readers pay for it. With moderate posting power comes great responsibility.

In the case of Takedown, I’m honestly not sure what to think. The initial Kickstarter attempt failed, so by posting it again this would seem to an endorsement to help bail them out. Maybe it is. Ultimately, I reasoned that covering it is just “the news” but there is that niggling doubt that this could be perceived as pushing our readers towards something that it could be said there just wasn’t enough interest in. So I’ll have take the claim that it was a botched marketing attempt at face value, join them in pressing the reset button and then watching how people respond. If there is now a sudden rush of interest, that’s validation. If there isn’t, then press and Kickstarter-using devs alike have all learned something. Eggshells may need to be walked upon.

Allen and his team (including veterans from Red Storm Entertainment, Monolith, Surreal, Microsoft, Ubisoft and Bungie) certainly have experience, and they’ve certainly identified a sadly-abandoned gap in the market, so I have no particular reservations about either pedigree or concept in this instance. What does worry me is the fact that, even after Kickstarter is successful (if it is), outside investment is required. That means a long road to the game actually happening, and heightened odds of fans not seeing the desired return on their pledge. An adventure game or a turn-based 2D RPG are one thing, but a full-3D, hyper-realistic shooter is an enormous undertaking, rife with opportunities (e.g. squad A.I.) to go wrong.

I’m interested, and I’d certainly like to see it happen – but I think we need to know a whole lot more about how much more money they really need and how likely it is that it’ll come in.

Thats the problem with this Kickstart. The normal Kickstart deal is “We need this much money to make this product happen, so if the project gets funded, we get your money, and we think its enough money to fund the product, but if we don’t reach the budget, you don’t get charged”
But this Kickstart is, we’ll charge you now then see if we can get the money we need.

It is a bit odd. What happens if their quest for venture capitalists goes as poorly as their Kickstarter campaign? They can’t afford to make the game at all?

I dislike the idea of Kickstarter projects being used to jumpstart for-profit investor interest. It removes even the illusion that the community is involved. This is like practice dating me so you can go find a real husband. I have some pride.

As far as I know, he already has agreement with several private investors they will fund a game if the kickstarter succeeds. So in case of success the game will probably be really made, and investors shouldn’t interfere with it’s direction too much.

I was unaware of this information. This actually makes it a lot more worth kickstarting, a game like this could not be made for an amount attainable on Kickstarter but having investors willing to finance the full project pending crowdfunding of the pre-alpha concept, I can actually get behind that.

It’s a shame he didn’t flesh the page out with the description he has now when it started, the target would of easily been met by now.

Really? That would make me LESS likely to donate. I thought Kickstarter was meant to be fore projects that wouldn’t get funded otherwise. Having investors say, “If you guys can convince people to give you the startup money, then we’ll jump on the bandwagon,” seems to be gaming the system, at least to me.

I really don’t see it that way. It isn’t a charitable scheme for donating to unfundable games, but simply an alternative method for game developers to get funding by going direct to their customers rather than being funded by their publisher.

The advantage for the developer and (hopefully!) the customer is that more creative control is retained by those who are making the game, and there isn’t a middle man who requires a slice of the profit.

“Yes, investors are lined up. They want to invest in the company and the team, they just are not convinced that this is the game the team should make. They are VC people and just want their investment to give returns, so of course they think the way to go would be to make mobile games for china (all the rage right now). They have already said yes if this is successful.”

I’m not at all interested in their business model. The project is either fan funded or it isn’t. If they need VC money for the majority of the development, then they are at their mercy when it comes to market decisions. Even though this is a good game idea in an under developed genre, it will always be more profitable for the investors to push it into the mainstream. The VC people have no interest in anything but the return on their dollar, so there will be tremendous pressure to water down the core elements of “hardcore tactical”. I have no confidence that this will do well if they make their $200k

As someone who does game programming logic, I can safely say that the amount of money they’re asking from their Kickstarter fund is not enough, and they really need to make a kickass Alpha to get another cash injection.

I wish those guys the best of luck, really, because AI alone is a bitch.

Glad they realised their mistake. I’ve been following this since the beginning and hope they’re gonna reach their goal. Or if it isn’t, at least other dev can take a lesson to do a pre-kickstarter phase by contacting more media and give them more material while maintain communication with their fans intensively via blog or forum.

This is a solid and substantial improvement. There’s no denying that Crowdsourced Hardcore Tactical Shooter was a LAZY attempt at crowdfunding, and Mr. Allen and others have clearly learned the massive difference between an idea and a project. I hope he gets his wish and I hope this works as a reminder to others that if you want people to pay attention, you need something worth paying attention to.

Looks interesting, but not enough to put my money on it. I’ve already contributed to FTL and Wasteland 2, and while FTL is pretty concrete, Wasteland is still just a dream (despite the mountain of cash behind it).

I’m glad RPS is trying to get some sort of guideline down for posting about Kickstarter projects. You guys don’t just do news, a lot of us rely on you to tell us where to put our hard earned currency. It would be nice to see a post outlining what you all consider a video game kickstarter should have (gameplay footage, playable something-or-other) in order to be post-worthy. It would benefit developers hoping to get attention, and give readers a more firm idea of what each post would have. Also, ‘pedigree’ could use some defining.

I’ve contributed to over 20 projects, and I *still* think this one is too shaky to contribute to.

The problem is that $200k isn’t enough to fund it, and he doesn’t have the rest of the money lined up yet. Investors are looking at it, but investors are *always* looking. Getting them to actually contribute is something else entirely.

Had he asked for enough money to actually complete it, I’d have gone for it. It’s unlikely he’d have raised that much, though, since he doesn’t have the proven record that other big-funding projects have had.

It’s not just virtually identical, the concept art is clearly drawn directly on top of that image down to the folds in the lead guy’s sleeves. They cartooned it up a bit, making certain elements like the safety glasses pop out more, but there is no element of original design to any of the subjects.

That image isn’t the only one. This is the original of the top image (from this article), taken from someone’s ImageShack account, and originally taken at a SWAT team demonstration in a high school (it’s image 10 in the post on the 2nd link).

Hmm, I’m actually thinking about funding now. I watched the original pitch and it was just that; a guy talking about what he was going to do in a very roundabout, unexciting way. Presented this way I feel inclined to donating, and not only because I enjoy brainy shooters. Sadly however, I do not own a credit card and because Amazon and PayPal are archenemies I can’t.

I think this Kickstarter is pretty unethical. You aren’t donating to get a project made, you are donating to be a bulletpoint on a Powerpoint slide that is going to be presented to a publisher in the hopes that they greenlight it.

I guess you could say they aren’t a publisher if this is the only game they are funding and they aren’t providing publisher services like advertising, localization, distribution, and legal assistance. If they are only entitled to a share of the revenues and don’t own the copyright to the game then they are also not acting like a typical publisher. But yeah its kind of a fine line to draw.

What exactly is unethical about it? No different from any of the other kickstarters and there is nothing deceptive about it. I have been wanting a game like this but i have been stuck playing RVS and SWAT4 for years now and now i have a chance to help get another game like it made. what is so bad about that?

This relaunch does look miles better than the original, which I remember thinking wasn’t nearly well-defined enough a proposal. And ‘I want to make a slow-paced tactical shooter. You may know me from my work on Halo: Reach’ didn’t exactly hit the spot as a pitch.

I’m still not persuaded to donate, though. I don’t think the budget is enough to produce anything more than an extremely rough proof of concept, and I don’t really believe there are a magical group of ‘uncertain’ investors just waiting for the Kickstarter to complete before swooping in. “Oh, we weren’t going to invest, but now we see you’ve just barely scraped past the extremely low funding target you set, we’re in.”

It says there that his investors, although agreeing to fund the game if the Kickstarter succeeds, would rather his team developed ‘mobile games for China’, though.

And based on the figures so far, it looks like to get the $200,000 figure he’d need about 5000-7000 total backers, which is a tiny number. If his investors are prepared to fully fund a major project on that basis, they’re idiots. More importantly, they’re idiots who would have a considerable say in how the game is developed down the line.

I’ve put up some cash for it. One thing of note in the Kickstarter is the rewards for funding are a bit shit, now that hasn’t stopped me before but it could make the difference between someone giving $20 and $50.

Is there already contract in place with these investors which states they’ll stump up the rest of the money on the condition they meet achieve the Kickstarter target? Can we see it? Can they at least tell us there is one, so they can’t then make a load of excuses about how it fell through later after they have our money?

I don’t mind the idea of customer funding and investor funding working in tandem, but that arrangement needs to be made ahead of time, not afterwards. I’m not funding them to *maybe* get enough money to make something, and I’m not accepting ‘the investors said they would’ as good enough. People say a lot of things in business, and it counts for virtually nothing at all unless a contract is in place.

This is the typical response people have when they see what game is at a glance and don’t bother actually reading what they are actually trying to accomplish. It’s also the reason why it probably wont get funded.

It’s the outside investment that stops me and many others I bet laying money down. Laying money down so they can make an Alpha to take to publishers in the hope they get funded again to make a game.

No chance.

I’m not paying for an Alpha. SImple.

He needs to do what many do, if he has that much faith in his product. Remortgage his house, goto the bank, help from family and friends or just do it after work.

Anyone seen Intruder? See can be done as an Indy wihtout $200,000 and then some from somehwere else.

One last thing, my faith in him to be honest has already dropped by miles. Surely he knew before he applied for the Kickstarter he had to do everything he could to get people to fund it, I mean everything, blood sweat and tears and then apply, not shove it on any old way and think it’s going to work and then with lets say two weeks to go realise his whole PR plan was shit.

If thats how he operates I don’t expect people to see any more than an Alpha if and I mean IF it gets made. Or they will get a normal dumbed down FPS as thats what the publishers made him make.

Absolutely, I was so utterly disappointed by the really futuristic approach of GRAW compared to the first (which was somewhat futuristic but not much) that I had to go and buy Ghost Recon twice (Mac and PC). Now I want to go and get a Rainbow Six game that isn’t Vegas or Vegas 2 (they were acceptably fun in co-op, if buggier than Fallout 3 and totally not realistic at all). Dah.

Well this article has proved expensive for me, I just bought Rainbow Six 3 Gold on Steam and I think I’m off to contribute to this Kickstarter.

Still dont understand how to sell their game. Fargo and shafer jump into a genera that doesnt exist anymore, so they can say, adventure game and old school rpg, there is nothing of the sort out there right now loke that short of some remakes and odd ranom games. What will this game have in it? Great its not cod and bf3 lololol those games are for nooobs theme doesnt address why i play his game instread of arma 2 or 3. What about project reality? Honestly raven shield still holds up pretty well.

The only thing i see is a call back to plan and go tac map, but that isnt enough to really say why this should have peoples money. What will the game have….still unanwsered.

Red Orchestra 2 just came out a few months ago.
Is that not a hardcore, unforgiving, tactical shooter?

I like the video, and the guys cause, but it’s not a game I want. Red Orchestra does the genre justice.

What I’d like to see is a hardcore, unforgiving, slow and methodical tactical shooter that’s based in the future.

Like, fighting inside space ships with microgravity simulated realistically, and having to worry about a room explosively decompressing because you missed you target, blasting you both out into space. Also, having your crosshair displayed on your visor, and it going out with EMP blasts forcing you to pop your visor and use iron sights.

I don’t feel like another rainbow 6 or red orchestra is meaningful. I think those games have been done about as well as they can be. Just like warplane simulators go, IL-2 can’t really be topped.

I think he’s aiming for something like a more military version of S.W.A.T 4, a game I liked a lot. The problem is that if I play a mission in S.W.A.T 4, the aim is to rescue any hostages without firing a shot.

Wheras in this guy’s Kickstarter, he’s still focusing to a tedious degree on how accurate and detailed the various guns are going to be. Yes, that adds something to the game, but if I ever see a pitched gun battle in this sort of game my thought is ‘I’ve just failed the mission’, not ‘goodness, those guns are modelled accurately’.

I want interesting tools to complete missions with, not a selection of virtually identical firearms, all of which the game wants me to avoid using.

Huge difference. Red Orchestra is not the kind of game Rainbow Six or SWAT3-4 were. RO is a multiplayer whack-a-mole. Sure, it might be aiming for a somewhat realistic and ambitious apporach, but still.
Then there’a ArmA, a soldier sim.
Even if you forget about what differs those titles from RS/SWAT, that’s two games. TWO games. How can you claim there is NOT a gap in the market here?

It makes me sound like a dick but I’m glad this won’t reach its goal. If you can’t create your full game with the money you get from Kickstarter then don’t put up a Kickstarter. Beyond that they have no idea what this project will be. First-person on PC, third on PS3, and TBD on 360? No thanks.

The fact that he went for kickstart without having a good pitch ironed out, a real working title, and has to double try is a warning flag to me. Don’t go for kickstart until your goddamn ready, i’m not a piggybank

Duuuuude i too missed the first post about this game!!! This is THE game i’ve been waiting for!! Damn I still play SWAT 4… And ARMA is great but it’s different…
And now this project’s only got 5 days left :( Really saddening…
Come on guys, spread the word a little.. they surely won’t get the 200.000 on time but at least we can show them there’s a player base..

I really wish there were more projects created by actual devs instead of suits.

“How is this different than shooters today? Aren’t Call of Duty and Battlefield tactical shooters?

There are a few key differences. What we are talking about here is primarily a slow-paced experience, where you need to move slowly and take your time, making your shots count. Running and gunning or bunny hopping will get you killed. There is no regenerating health or cover systems, and no jumping into a fighter jet, it’s all down to your skill, your rifle, and your teamwork.”

“How much realism will be in this game?

Realism will be the basis for the gameplay features, balanced with fun. Weapons handling and character damage will be based on realism. No regenerating health, see around corner cover systems, or magically resurrected team members. “

Mm. Sorry, but 2D turn-based party-based RPGs and 2D point-n-click adventures (from arguably the most successful creators of such adventure games) are genres that haven’t been properly served in at least ten to fifteen years, that I’m passionately interested in, and that can be plausibly fully funded without outside investors based solely on a successful Kickstarter. Tactical plan-and-execute shooters of the old Rainbow Six style haven’t been absent as long, aren’t nearly as compelling to me to begin with, and can’t really be done to today’s standards on a Kickstarter budget. And asking me to fund a demo to show to investors? pfhahaha. No. You can’t possibly guarantee delivery in that scenario.

Even tho I really liked the genre and played a lot, I don’t “love” it, is not what fascinates me. To that, add that the Kickstarter doesn’t get the game made, but just a semi-fat wallet to lure investors in. It just doesn’t justify the support.

About the worry about pushing your readers… Understandable, but I like to think of myself as more than a mere sheep to be guided. I can take my own decisions.

Simply not my kind of game, I never liked rainbow six either. Also, the market is saturated with shooters. I understand this is a different shooter, but you set yourself up with a PR nightmare this way imo.

I’ll be interested to see if this takes of, but I dislike them using the KS money to find other investors, it feels like cheating.

$95,000 in t4 days? Asking alot that, though after all i’ve said I would be pleased for them if they where funded. I just wouldn’t risk it myself. it’s the only one where I have my doubts the game will happen.